For this review Kingston has sent over one of their newest solid state drives, the 240GB SSDNow mS200, model number SMS200S3/240G. This is not your typical 2.5" SSD, but an mSATA drive whose footprint is eight times smaller, making it ideal for use in laptops and tablets. While the physical size is much smaller with this form factor, you can still achieve transfer rates and capacities to rival the best 2.5" drives.



The promotional image above shows the compact card to be reviewed. At just about 51mm long, 30mm wide, and just a few millimeters thick it is clear why this is the form factor of choice for portable devices. Even desktop motherboards have started to support mSATA drives as it is fairly easy to integrate a controller and connector on to a board in order to take advantage of the power of these compact storage devices.

Before taking a look at the sample provided for review, let's look at some of the features and specifications as taken from the official product page on the Kingston website...

Features:

» mSATA interface â€" fully compliant with industry standard, easy to fit, guaranteed to work
» NAND Flash memory based â€" shock resistant with low power consumption
» Supports Intel’s SRT â€" combines capacity advantage of HDD with performance improvements of SSD in dual-storage configuration
» Supports S.M.A.R.T. â€" monitors the status of your drive
» Supports TRIM â€" maintains maximum performance on compatible operating systems
» Guaranteed â€" three-year warranty (two-year warranty on 30GB), free technical support

Specifications:

» Form factor: mSATA
» Interface: SATA Rev. 3.0 (6Gb/s), SATA Rev. 2.0 (3Gb/s), SATA Rev. 1.0 (1.5Gb/s)
» Capacity: 240GB (30GB, 60GB, 120GB, 480GB also available)
» Encryption: AES 128bit
» Sequential Read/Write: 240GB â€" 540 MB/s / 530MB/s
» Maximum 4k Read/Write: 240GB â€" up to 72,000 / up to 40,000 IOPS
» Random 4k Read/Write: 240GB â€" up to 21,000 / up to 41,000 IOPS
» PCMARK® Vantage HDD Suite Score: 60,000
» Power Consumption: 0.4W Idle / 1.2 (TYP) Read / 1.8 W (TYP) Write
» Storage temperatures: -40°C ~ 85°C
» Operating temperatures: 0°C ~ 70°C
» Dimensions: 50.88mm x 30mm
» Weight: 6.86g
» TRIM: Supported
» Vibration operating: 2.17G Peak
» Vibration non-operating: 20G Peak
» MTTF: 1,000,000 Hrs
» Warranty/support: three-year warranty with free technical support
» Total Bytes Written (TBW): 585TB, 2 DWPD

This tiny 240GB drive is rated for some impressive read/write numbers. With a sequential read of 540MB/s and a sequential write of 530MB/s, this drive will clearly make the most of a SATA III connetion! And with an idle power consumption of just 0.4W, your portable device's battery life shouldn't suffer.